mciampag

I pulled on it.

The silver box is the SIR-PNR2, black box is BTB200, small silver box on the right is the rearview camera box. The antenna is for the GPS, Sirius is near the windshield. BTB microphone on the left side of the cavity. All of this is covered with the dash panel.

Service Provider: Verizon Wireless

Phone-SW Version: LG VX8300

Autoconnect: Yes

Basic Function: (Make & Recieve a call, Call History, Preset Memory) Yes, haven't tried preset memory yet

Phone Book Transfer: Yes, 1 contact at a time.

Voice Calling: Haven't tried it

Signal & Battery Strength Indicator: Yes / Yes

BT Audio Capable?: Not tested

Your JPEG files are not >4.7 GB, unless you have thousands of them.

Follow the directions exactly as the manual says, and it will work fine. Use a pic size of 500x240 pixels for best results (or similar aspect ratio).

I used a DVD, put 1 image in a folder called "pictures", and added some junk files (large pdfs) to meet the disk usage requirement. Worked just fine. Keep in mind the manual says you can not use music files to meet the usage minimum.

Good news for Verizon users!

The BTB200 DOES autoconnect (the BTB100 did NOT).

Confirmed success with VX8300.

However you can still only send 1 contact at a time.

When you're having location trouble, do you have a strong satellite signal? I live north of Baltimore and had trouble over the last few days when it was cloudy. The clouds seemed to weaken the signal (3 satellites instead of 7). I also noticed that on the cloudy days, it took longer to initially acquire the signal. If I started driving away before the system had finished loading, it didn't calculate my position correctly, but fixed itself after the first red light I came to.

I haven't had routing issues, but I've had 2 problems with address searches. One was a doctor's office on a hospital campus. The map showed the roads clearly, but the finish point was ~1/4 mile away from the actual address. I was looking for street number 3456 and the nav told me I had arrived when I was staring at mailbox #3428. The other time the nav told me to turn left and I had arrived when there was no building in sight. I had to turn around, go back through the intersection and hang a right, another 1/4 mi behind where it directed me. Again the roads and the route seemed correct, but the address was wrong.

For what it's worth, there are a series of other backgrounds on the Nav disks. I think there are 3 patterns in each of the menu colors (blue, red, white, green, yellow). Or upload your own.

How often do you drive places where you actually NEED the Nav disk? I spend 90% of my time driving to/from work and other local places that I know well. I know where the gas stations are, where the restaurants are, and multiple routes to get there.

The memory navi can also be set to remember an area around your current location, if no route is selected. If you're using the D3 during your normal commute, this should be all you need and the DVD slot is available for CDs/DVDs.

The east/west navi disk split is roughly around the Mississippi river, but the disks overlap considerably. You'll never have to swap the disks unless you plan a multi-state east/west roadtrip.

I have the BC2, mounted at the top of the rear window, inside the car. I put it inside the car because I was a little concerned with possible fender-benders damaging my $250 camera.

http://filebox.vt.edu/users/mciampag/Mazda/Mark's%20Car%20Pics%20019b.JPG

The bumper isn't in the picture, but I can see the ground ~30" behind the car, and I can see objects at bumper-height ~18" behind the car.

All verizon phones (that I'm aware of) will NOT autoconnect with the BTB100.

That means if you want to connect your phone, you must follow these steps:

1) Register your phone (only done once per phone, forever)

2) Turn the phone and D3 on.

3) Touch 'BT-Tel', it will say no connection.

4) Touch 'Menu'

5) Touch 'Function'

6) Touch 'Connect Phone'

7) Touch 'Direct Connect'

Touch the name of the phone you want to connect.

After that your phone will be connected until you turn off the car.

Alternatively, you could set the BT on your phone to be 'visible' immediately before turning on the D3. If you do this, the D3 WILL autoconnect (meaning you don't have to touch anything on the screen to connect), but Verizon phones will only stay 'visible' for 60 seconds. After that, you've got to go through the above process.

Apparently Cingular RAZRs will autoconnect with the BTB200 (but not BTB100), no word on the Verizon phones.

The CD-BTB200 is the same hardware as the CD-BTB100, so there will not be any change to phone compatibility. What has changed is the mic gain is lowered, to reduce echo, and the auto-connect feature will work with Motorola phones. That's it.

If you don't mind me asking, where's your information coming from? I've heard several different 'theories' throughout this thread.

Also, you say the auto-connect feature will work with Motorola phones... that sounds to me like a change to phone compatibility...

No I didn't connect the VSS, I've been having trouble finding it. I thought I had posted that, must have erased it. Anyway, I know that's an issue, I'm hoping it'll be better once I DO find the VSS.

PS - If you know where the '07 Mazdaspeed3 VSS is, please let me know

I found a nice looking Mazda screen in the custom gallery. I have no idea what page it's on. It's a silver mazda logo (like the one on your turnk) on a black background, and the word "mazda" underneath.

I cut out the word 'mazda' and changed the logo to red to match the dash. I think it looks awesome, very clean and simple. I'll try and remember to post it later tonight.

Any update on the BTB200? I'm still waiting on mine from Crutchfield, with fingers crossed that Verizon compatibility is improved.

The better install shops will keep a photo album of past work. If they don't have anything to show you, walk away.

Mine screwed up at the beginning <50 miles because it hadn't learned well. Now it screws up when it can't get a good satellite connection. It also seems to take a minute of standing still before it really locks in on the satellites. If I start my car up and drive away immediately it gets confused occasionaly, but corrects itself at the first red light.

If you get pulled over, the cop will be looking into your car while you have the parking brake on. He'd have to hop in and go for a ride with you >15 mi/hr to check for bypass...

I haven't heard of ANY Verizon phones that will autoconnect with the BTB100.

All I know for sure is that my VX8300 does NOT. I'm willing to bet your Chocolate (VX8500) won't either.

I don't think any of them will. Verizon's phones can be set 'visible' to BT devices for ONLY 60 seconds. During those 60 seconds, your phone WILL autoconnect. Once the time limit expires and your phone goes back to 'hidden', it will NOT autoconnect.

You can 'direct connect' through the menu on the D3, even if your phone is 'hidden'. If it would automatically try to 'direct connect' with my phone, I'd be a happy camper. There are other BT devices that DO autoconnect with Verizon phones, so it's a software oversight in the Pioneer unit.

I'm hoping the BTB200 will actively try to connect to a registered phone on start-up. I've got mine on back-order already.

Try Sirius if you don't like the XM sound quality. I've got XM in a car with a nice aftermarket system, and Sirius connected to a D3 and stock Mazda speakers. The Sirius is definitely a better sound. Still not as good as my iPod or CDs, but much better than XM.

The only downside is that the D3 Sirius interface is absolutely horrible.

I put mine underneath the dash, dead center (Mazdaspeed3). The Sirius didn't get a signal well, but the GPS is connecting to most 5 or 6 satellites.

Then you didn't read MY post in that thread.

I've used both XM and Sirius, though in 2 different cars. I have Sirius with the D3.

Better interface for D3 is hands-down the XM. The Sirius interface is absolutely terrible. You get a 1-line display (scrolling), no category/channel list (only up/down buttons), and the presets get saved as "Preset 1, Preset 2", etc. You have to remember which station you saved to each preset. Read the D3 manual to see what the XM interface looks like.

I think Sirius has an edge in sound quality. After listening to XM exclusively for a period of time, I used to think my stereo components were failing or my head unit settings had been changed. Then I switched back to a CD or iPod and everything sounded awesome again. That car has a decent aftermarket system installed. I think the Sirius sounds better on a stock system than XM on my aftermarket. XM seems to cut the bass and treble frequencies, resulting in a flat, almost muffled sound. Sirius is still not close to CD-quality, but it's better than XM and much better than FM.

My FM reception is no worse than stock.

XM vs. Sirius: http://avic411.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3396

I don't trust factory grounds, so here's how I did it.

I gathered the AVIC ground wire, parking brake wire, bluetooth ground, camera ground, and Sirius ground and soldered the ends together, along with ~18" of 10 gauge wire to extend the ground lead. I hate extending grounds, but I swear my interior is entirely made of plastic. I soldered a large washer to the other end of the 10 awg wire (homemade ring connector). I found a hole in the chassis near the gearshift, so I sanded the paint off, screwed the washer down on the chassis with a large metal screw, and called it a day. It holds nice and tight.

Since the cell phone mute wire is pretty short, I cut the connector off and used one of the Pioneer-provided wire taps to connect the mute wire to the parking brake wire. Since this wasn't a part of the main power supply circuit, I figured there should be no problem tapping one of the other grounded wires to make my life easier. It worked like a charm, everything functions in good order, and the only thing I have to worry about possibly falling off is the mute wire tap. Not the end of the world, shouldn't short anything out, just disable the bypass if that happens.

For what it's worth, I don't trust the factory power either. The fuses of all my components add up to 15 A, the stock radio is on a 7.5 A fuse (the AVIC alone is 10 A). I ran a new 10 awg (fused at 20 A) power wire from the battery to the radio cavity, where I connected the various power leads. The AVIC reports a steady ~14.3 V, so I figure my connections must be fine.

I've been looking for the same thing, got an '07 Mazdaspeed3. I've been working with a guy I found online who recently purchased the MS3 electrical system shop manual.

There is no VSS that we can tap. The VSS goes directly to the CAN BUS as part of the DSC system. He also suggested tapping a wheel speed sensor instead. I haven't tried it yet, why do you think that won't work? The AVIC will calibrate to whatever signal you give it, so long as it's proportional to the car's speed. I know people with regular 3's have successfully used the shaft speed sensor on the transmission (that we don't have on the Speed3). I would think wheel speed should work fine.